Sarasota County, like the State of Florida as a whole, saw a majority of voters come in the General Election come out in favor of medical marijuana but not enough to beat a steep 60-percent threshold for constitutional amendments. But the measure here fell short of the threshold based solely on votes cast before Nov. 4, according to an election analysis by SRQ Media Group. Almost 61 percent of voters at polls on Election Day backed the proposal.

That seemed especially interesting in the fact that Election Day voters favored Republican candidates while those who voted early supported Democrats. For example, Democrat Charlie Crist won almost 53 percent of absentee ballots for governor in Sarasota County while Republican Rick Scott took more than 54 percent of the vote on Election Day.

“Who would have thought all of those Republicans would have voted for marijuana?,” said Joe Gruters, chairman of the Republican Party of Sarasota.

In fact, the Republican Party locally had opposed the marijuana amendment while the Sarasota Democratic Party supported it, just as Scott opposed the measure while Crist supported it.

Gruters said party opposition was largely on constitutional grounds, and that legalizing marijuana for medical purposes should be an issue tackled in the Florida Legislature and not in the state constitution. 

Statewide, the measure won 57.62 percent of the vote, passing the 60 percent threshold in only nine of 67 counties. In Sarasota County, 58.58 percent of all voters supported the amendment.

SRQ Media Group on Wednesday will host its Where The Votes Are event Wednesday morning from 7:30-9am. Results of elections from Congress down to municipal offices will be discussed in a precinct-by-precinct analysis of results. The event is free and open to the public. Please RSVP to WTVA@srqmediagroup.com.